•Ω•An ever so slightly forgettable third album from the London band•Ω• Winning over Charlatans frontman Tim Burgess and former Creation Records honcho Alan McGee, Hatcham Social made a fairly successful early bid for pop stardom in their native England. Formed: 2006Location: New Cross, London, UKAlbum release: February 3, 2014Record Label: O GenesisDuration: 40:00Tracks:01 Ketamine Queen 7:4602 All That I Can See Is a Gun 2:5103 Confessions of An English Opium Smoker 3:4504 To the Moon (Is This the Way Man Will Survive) 4:2905 Spirit of ‘45 2:3406 More Power to Live 3:1007 Lion With a Laser Gun 6:0108 All in the Moscow 2:2509 Stay True to Your Family 3:2310 Don’t Go to Sleep 3:36 Members :•Ω•Finnigan Kidd•Ω•Toby Kidd•Ω•David Claxton•Ω•Riley DiffordREVIEWJohn Calvert, Score: 5/10•Ω•Londoners Hatcham Social have been carving their own furrow with their blend of ‘60s beat music, avant garde and angular post~punk since 2006. Field Music and British Sea Power are the closest comparisons. Unfortunately, the odd flash of delicate charm aside (shy ballad ‘Don’t Go To Sleep’ is a real tearjerker), on this ever so slightly forgettable third album they are not their usual inventive selves. On ‘Spirit Of 45’ they sound like a depressed Best Coast, and ‘More Power To Live’ is just crusty classic rock. •Ω•Yes, they write pretty and moving songs, but it’s reasonable to expect more from a band with a history of writing such sophisticated pop. (http://www.nme.com/)REVIEWBY LAURENCE DAY, 10 FEBRUARY 2014, 09:30 GMT, SCORE: 7•Ω•The Charlatan’s Tim Burgess has finally got what it appears he’s coveted for many moons — Hatcham Social. Renowned as a fan of the New Cross indie troupe — once upon a time calling them a “wonderful pop group with the world’s coolest drummer” — he’s putting out their third full~length LP on his own label, O Genesis.•Ω•Cutting Up the Present Leaks Out the Future was recorded live, straight to tape, in less than a week; in some ways, this ensures that even eight years into their career, Hatcham Social sound as grazed~elbow raw and brimming with youthful naiveté as when they were formed.•Ω•In obvious thrall to the halcyon ‘70s — especially the six~stringer legends of Lou Reed/Velvet Underground and Ray Davies, and to a lesser extent the denizens CBGBs — Hatcham Social relive an explosive, vital and electric time in music via modern themes and contemporary motives. It doesn’t sound drowned in nostalgia or particularly indebted to the past’s essence, but you can hear the ageing timbres and reverb~laced jangle~rock superimposed over their indie~pop tendencies. It’s a combination they’ve thrived off for years, and it’s not holding them back now; as opposed to them becoming stagnant, it’s kept them icebox~fresh.•Ω•“Ketamine Queen”, with oodles of opiate vocals from pipesman Tobias Kidd, sizzles along on repeated narcotic guitar riffs — faintly folky, completely delirious. There’s the odd ebb of avante~garde minimalist synth creeping in, akin to a squall through single~glazing, which is reminiscent of early synthesiser~based music from decades of yore. Following punkily on, “All That I See Is A Gun” howls with hard~rock licks and testosterone~fuelled genitals — Kidd’s vox aren’t especially matching in the brutal short cut, but who’s focusing on those when some scrummy fretwork is being noodled?•Ω•That’s where the LP succeeds; the repetitive pinnacles are the guitars. They’re simple, enamoured with shades of veteran legends, but they’re honest. Unpretentious. It’s especially nice in a time when everyone and their dog has something to prove with a guitar, that we see a band go back to the most basic basics, like rock’n’roll (“More Power To Live”), rockabilly (“Confessions Of An English Opium Smoker”) and generations when people still fawned over guitar solos. ? This is all bulky chords and strummed motif. Even Temples, BBC and Picastro, who’s albums are terrific, aren’t really nailing simplicity — not at all a bad thing, but Hatcham Social’s axe methods are a welcome contrast.•Ω•Cutting Up The Present Leaks The Future is a refreshing listen. Its lo~fi aesthetic, invigorating guitar approach, nuanced throwbacks, heartfelt lyrics and general quality (among many other fascinating titbits) all make for a lovely record. It’s not tacked onto the bombast brigade — there’s few tracks, save perhaps “Lion With A Lazer Gun”, which is the album’s most oomphy few minutes of gumption — but rather prefers to slink and slither underfoot, carefully caressing and massaging your brain cells. It’s a grower, not a shower. A thinker, not a… a… erm…•Ω•Anyway. Basically, in summary: it’s great, and a valuable addition to Hatcham Social’s canon, but not a record that’ll smack you upside the chops to impress you. You’ve gotta cajole it first — wine it, dine it. Give it the attention and respect it deserves, and you’ll reap the rewards. Fortaken: http://www.thelineofbestfit.com/REVIEWAndrew Tran, February 26th, 2014; Score: 7.9/10•Ω•Hatcham Social: Cutting up the Present Leaks out the Future — in the later 2000s, Hatcham Social caught the public eye with a string of honeybee~bright indie pop singles along the lines of Shout Out Louds, and with heavy nods to Morrissey and Merseybeat. As charming as they were, these singles and the accompanying albums You Dig the Tunnel, I’ll Hide the Soil and About Girls never strayed out of the circle inscribing their endless guitar~pop party. Then came Cutting up the Present Leaks out the Future, their third full~length album and the most introspective, fully~realized production they’ve yet released.•Ω•Returning fans will know something’s up from the get~go; track one, ‘Ketamine Queen’, is a dour Syd Barrett acoustic ballad swaddled in blind echoes and reverb. The fall from Beatle~pop to Barrett~pondering is a long and startling one, but not unpleasant. It’s an affecting, albeit cold lullaby that stakes out the dreamy, indeterminate tone of the album, with lines like “In our heads/where we are safe/in our fishbowl/so far away”. With a discography like Hatcham Social’s, an opener like this is a statement. And a somewhat puzzling one too, as tracks two and three launch straight back to the buzz~pop they’re known for, but it’s different, in minuscule ways.•Ω•It’s as though they’re nailed down somehow — the jumpier tracks aren’t as loud as they might be, and throughout the record I got the impression that lead vocalist Toby Kidd was singing to himself. Not that any of this detracts from the quality of their sound; on the contrary, it always felt to me like they could take the cheekiness down on a notch, and I think they dialed it down just the right amount on Cutting up the Present Leaks out the Future. The melodies speak for themselves now, like potent poetry softly spoken. Don’t get me wrong, though — the guitars are still completely ripping on tracks like ‘All That I Can See Is a Gun’ and ‘Confessions of an English Opium Smoker’. Actually, I think the licks and solos are probably the strongest they’ve ever been, possibly aided by the album’s context of mental strain and existential wandering.•Ω•The best descriptor of the band’s shift might be that everything’s wrapped in a Velvet Underground ironic restraint. The off~ness reminds the listener of Lou Reed’s possessed~by~a~precocious~child sort of feel, and the guitars have a similarly mild, buzzy carbonation enveloping the tones. Instead of tossing their sound outwards and over the wall to the audience on the other side, Hatcham Social takes the VU route and vibes it through the wall’s concrete, or burrows it through dream~channels beneath the wall. Factor in the string backings and gentle sway on ‘Stay True to Your Family’ and you could give an educated guess as to what’s been on their Spotify as of late.•Ω•Dreaminess dominates half of the record, and acts as the backdrop to the jangle~pop. Kidd’s pensiveness bleeds through on tracks like ‘To the Moon (Is This the Way Man Will Survive)’, ostensibly a love-letter asking a lady~friend on a date to the moon, but it’s not a lover’s moon. It’s the moon of inevitability, a gatekeeper into an oppressive uncertainty: “To make the journey’s all we have/to die like this would be too sad”. It’s moments like this that give the soloing and the electric licks something to fight for at last, and which give Cutting up the Present Leaks out the Future a gravity beyond anything they’ve ever written. The nocturnality returns on ‘Lion with a Lazer Gun’, a lost Franz Ferdinand number that wanders dark streets, singing, “In the nighttime/where the demons stare/in the evening where I found a place to hide/I slip away”. It’s driven by a new~wave snick and scatter percussive style, and guitar lines that cut in the dark like a dull machete through jungle vines.•Ω•The album ends on a dancer afraid of the dark: ‘Don’t Go to Sleep’ has a nearly tragic desperation to it, as Kidd murmurs and shimmies by himself in a club at closing time. The vocals are flung to the corners, and the surf~like riffs strain to keep their eyes open with nimble jabs and maneuvers, to no avail; it all ends on the warp of a record pulled from the needle.•Ω•If you’ve been following Hatcham Social for a while, you can’t afford to miss this headspinner of a record, and if you’re joining them for the first time, sit back and enjoy the riffs and sleepwalker moments… Fortaken:http://www.violentsuccess.com/Also:By colleyc · February 11, 2014 · •Ω•http://musicalpearls.vlsweb.net.br/?p=44980Discography:Albums:•Ω•2009 You Dig The Tunnel, I'll Hide The Soil (UK) Fierce Panda•Ω•2009 You Dig The Tunnel, I'll Hide The Soil (US) TBD Records•Ω•2012 About Girls (UK) Fierce Panda•Ω•2014 Cutting Up The Present Leaks Out The Future(UK) OGenesis RecordsEP´s:•Ω•2007 Found In The Woods (edition 1) cassette tape, PopGrooves•Ω•2007 Found In The Woods (edition 2) cassette tape, PopGrooves•Ω•2008 Party mp3 download, PopGrooves•Ω•2008 Crystal World (Japan only) CD, Vinyl Junkie•Ω•2009 Postcard In Colours (US and Canada only) CD, TBD RecordsTIM BURGESSBirth name: Timothy Allan BurgessBorn: 30 May 1967, Salford, Lancashire, EnglandGrew up mostly in: Northwich, Cheshire, UKSolo:•Ω•Burgess’s debut solo album, I Believe, was released in Europe on 3 September 2003 and included the track "Oh My Corazon".•Ω•In 2012, Burgess explained the origin of his second solo album Oh No I Love You:•Ω•The root of this album goes right back to a Kurt Wagner show in Manchester. I carried Kurt’s guitar to the car for him. I took the chance to ask him if he would ever consider writing a song with me. He said, “Sure Tim, you write the music and I'll write the words.” That one song turned into an album and almost ten years after we first talked about it, the album is ready.•Ω•Oh No I Love You also features collaborations with Factory Floor, R. Stevie Moore and My Morning Jacket, among others. The album was produced by Mark Nevers and recorded at his home in Nashville, Tennessee, US. The album was later nominated for the Artrocker ‘Album Of The Year’ award in 2012.O Genesis:•Ω•O Genesis is Burgess’s own record label, founded in 2011. A compilation CD, featuring the label’s artists, was released by the label on 10 March 2014. Burgess appears as a solo artist on the compilation album, alongside artists such as Minny Pops, Hatcham Social and Jack Underwood.Discography:•Ω•I Believe 8 September 2003•Ω•Oh No I Love You 1 October 2012Personal life:•Ω•Burgess’s autobiography, Telling Stories, was published in 2012 by Viking Press. Following the release of the book, Burgess responded to a question about whether he would have changed anything about his career:•Ω•No, because I would have had to re~write it again! Everything that happened happened because we made a decision at a point in time and at certain ages. I had a relationship with drugs for quite a long time. I’m glad it’s over but at the same time I don’t regret it. I must have enjoyed it because I did it for so long. It’s the same with the relationship with other people. They lasted as long as they did because they were mostly quite good.•Ω•In the The Daily Telegraph in 2012, Burgess explained why he practices Transcendental Meditation:•Ω•At the minimum it de~stresses you. You get thoughts — it’s not psychedelic — but things pop into your brain. John Lennon used to stop and write his ideas down: “I choose not to. I’m enjoying myself so much I don’t want to stop.”•Ω•In February 2013, Burgess replaced BBC Radio 6 Music host Lauren Laverne, while she and other National Union of Journalists (NUJ) members engaged in strike action against the BBC.•Ω•In March 2014, during a BBC Radio 6 interview with Roddy Frame, it was revealed that Burgess is a fan of the music of both Frame and Edwyn Collins, and invited the pair to play at a Manchester cafe that he owns. Frame stated during the interview that Burgess is “so positive” and both will occasionally drink tea together. Website: http://hatchamsocialofficial.co.uk/ / Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HatchamSocial?fref=ts_______________________________________________________________